Entries tagged with
privatization
When Bill 11 passed in December 2025, Alberta became the first province to legislate two-tier health care — a system that gives faster access to those who can pay and longer waits for those who can’t afford to jump the queue — for medically necessary services. This report shows how the Health Statutes Amendment Act puts Canadian medicare at risk and opens the door for American health insurance corporations to enter the Canadian market.
Challenging 'Parental Rights'
A Primer for Parents, Students, Educators, and Advocates
A specific brand of “parental rights” is increasingly being weaponized to justify restrictions on inclusive practices in Alberta’s education system. At the same time, one key feature of this agenda — the push for “school choice” — is laying the groundwork for broader privatization. This report shows where these efforts are coming from, what’s at stake, and how to fight for schools that are inclusive of all parents, not just a vocal minority rooted in conservative organizations.
Red Flags
Smith, DynaLIFE, and the Precarious Future of Health Care in Alberta
When we as Albertans look back on what the labs rollercoaster has cost us — the hundreds of millions wasted, the generational damage to our health-care workforce, the erosion of trust in the delivery of a vital service — all of it may be dwarfed by the long-term damage being wrought to our health-care system in its name.
Danielle Smith tried — again — to blame AHS for the province’s health care woes. Alas (for her), hard data has a way of catching up with misleading statements. This article show how responsibility for the poor performance, high costs, and potential irregularities in Alberta’s surgical crisis sits squarely with the government.
As allegations of political interference and price gouging in private surgical contracts rock Alberta’s health-care system, a new report by Parkland Institute provides critical context, revealing how privatization has dramatically increased costs, undermined public hospitals, and prolonged wait times for critical surgeries.
Operation Profit
Private Surgical Contracts Deliver Higher Costs and Longer Waits
New data analyzed in this report shows that the costs of private surgical services under the Alberta Surgical Initiative have skyrocketed, even as patients face increasingly long waits — including for cancer and other critical surgeries. Meanwhile, Alberta is one of only three provinces where real per capita hospital spending has been steadily declining for the past decade.
Misleading Narratives
Pay-to-play queue-jumping won’t fix surgery wait times
This blog post critically responds to a recent Calgary Herald opinion piece on surgical wait times in Alberta. It shows how spending taxpayers’ money in private surgical centers not only failed to resolve the issue but also made it worse. The post also presents evidence-based solutions to reduce wait times in the public system.
Failing to Deliver
The Alberta Surgical Initiative and Declining Surgical Capacity
Through Freedom of Information requests, statistical analysis, and a review of the research literature, this report evaluates claims made by the Alberta government about the effectiveness of the Alberta Surgical Initiative in reducing wait times and the role of for-profit surgical outsourcing. Based on the research evidence, the report recommends that the provincial government shift away from for-profit surgical delivery and fully commit to public system improvement.
The UCP government is on a mission to change the landscape of higher education in Alberta. Cutting to the bone the operating budgets of universities and colleges is the most visible strategy used to advance their privatization agenda. But another front in this process—one that has been largely absent from the public debate—is how the UCP is aggressively using governance models in post-secondary institutions to transform them from within.
Higher Education - Corporate or Public?
How the UCP is Restructuring Post-Secondary Education in Alberta
The United Conservative Party (UCP) government has, from 2018 to 2022, cut the operating support budget for Alberta’s PSEIs by 18.8%, resulting in a trail of destruction across the province’s universities, colleges, and technical institutes. This report addresses two questions. First, we ask what the agenda and actions of the United Conservative Party government of Alberta mean for higher education and research. Second, we ask how institutional factors explain the sector’s lack of autonomy and ability to resist the corporatization agendas of governments.